By Okechukwu Okechukwu
Anambra State Keke Drivers Forum (AKDF), a conglomerate of tricycle operators, Tuesday, appealed to governor Chukwuma Soludo to disband the State Joint Enforcement Team (ANJET) alleging that touts have hijacked the platform and currently diverting State revenues.
ANJET was created by the Governor in 2022 as an enforcement outfit charged with the responsibilities of supervising, monitoring and enforcing compliance to the payment of taxes in Anambra state.
But Keke operators, while addressing the media after supervising some ongoing infrastructural projects initiated by the governor, argued that ANJET had been compromised following infiltraction of the disbanded touts who have equally started diverting the State tax proceeds to their individual pockets as well as brutalizing Keke operators and tricycle operators daily.
According to Coordinator of AKDF, Comrade Osita Obi, most members of ANJET also engage in cultism and touting, collect and divert government taxes as against governor Soludo's drive to build peaceful, liveable and prosperous Anambra.
Obi expressed fear that the touts if not disbanded, could make Soludo to fail to deliver on his mandate or even force him to go beyond the qualities on roads and other ongoing infrastructural projects.
He further suggested that the best way to block revenue leakages in the State with regards to drivers, is for the governor to constitute Anambra State Keke and Shuttle Bus Management Committee to be led by drivers of tricycles and shuttle buses.
To him, the committees when properly constituted and inaugurated, would help the government to gather accurate data of their members, mobilise and enforce them to comply to digital taxations in the State.
"We are happy for the qualities of roads and other infrastructural works ongoing in the State. I have been to Amasea, Awa, Ufuma road. We are now at Umuogbu village (Awka) where governor Soludo is constructing erosion control. You can see the quality and standard of works here. We drove through some ongoing road projects along Kenneth Dike library and Roban stores. We have seen that our taxes are working.
"We will mobilise our members to join the government digitalised tax net. Not just our members, we will also take the gospel to industrialists, business executives, traders, politicians, the rich and others to pay their taxes so that the governor will have more money to develop our State. But one more thing we are appealing to Mr Governor is to disband ANJET.
"Most of ANJET members are cultists and touts. They collect government revenue and pocket them. Mr governor should rather constitute and inaugurate Anambra State Keke and Shuttle Bus Management Committee. The Committee should be led by recognized drivers of tricycles and shuttle buses, not by proxy. That is the best way to get more of them into the tax net. They will help the government to gather their data, enforce their compliance to tax payment and prevent crimes," he added.
Also speaking, Mr Victor Asumougha, a tricycle operator from Onitsha/Nkpọr axis, and his colleague from Awka axis, Mr Uche Umeh, praised the governor for placing ban on touting in Anambra State, but argued that lack of proper enforcement of the order and current recruitment of them into ANJET was affecting both tricycle businesses and State IGR on daily basis.
According to the tricyclists, some touts under ANJET still force, harass and path way with their hard earned currencies instead of enforcing compliance to tax payments.
Addressing the newsmen after the tour, the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Operation Clean and Healthy Anambra (Ocha brigade), Comrade Celestine Anere, assured the group that governor Soludo was determined to exterminate touting, illegal revenue collections and criminalities in the State.
Anere, therefore, charged them to remain peaceful, tax compliance, as well as supports government policies, while going about their private businesses and works.
